Britain warns Russia faces fresh sanctions for 'unacceptable' cyber attack as Theresa May and the Dutch PM blast the Kremlin for showing a total 'disregard for the global values and rules that keep us safe'

Theresa May and Mark Rutte vowed to protect West from Kremlin attacks

Said Russia is showing disregard for the global values which keep the world safe

GRU agents tried to hack into the chemical weapons watchdog after Salisbury

Theresa May today tore into Russia for its 'unacceptable cyber activities' and vowed to hit back to defend the international order against their strikes.

In a joint statement with the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, she said the Kremlin is showing flagrant 'disregard' for the global values which keep the world safe.

While Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt warned Moscow that Britain and its allies will not take the naked aggression 'lying down'.

He said: 'If they think they can get away with flouting international law, trying to destabilise the way democracies go about their business, sending agents in to use chemical weapons on British soil for the first time in our history.

'If they think we are just going to lie down and accept that they are wrong. There will be consequences and they will regret doing this.'

And his deputy, Foreign Office Minister Sir Alan Duncan, warned that a British power station or a major bank could be next on Russia's hit list.

Theresa May (pictured left at her party conference in Birmingham yesterday) and Dutch PM Mark Rutte (pictured at the UN Assembly in September today tore into Russia for its 'unacceptable cyber activities' and vowed to hit back to defend the international order against their strikes

Jeremy Hunt (pictured today)warned Russia it could be slapped with more sanctions after its intelligence agents were expose for trying to hack he chemical weapons organisation

The Dutch Defence Ministry this morning took the extraordinary step of naming and picturing four Russian agents involved in the attack on the OPCW in April.

The team of GRU officers - travelling on official Russian passports - entered the Netherlands on April 10, just a month after the Salisbury nerve agent attack.

Three days later, they parked a car carrying specialist hacking equipment outside the headquarters of the OPCW in the The Hague, where the novichok attack was being investigated.

But, before they could initiate the hacking attack, Dutch counter-intelligence officers descended on the vehicle and seized the men, who were kicked out of the country.

The attempt on the OPCW headquarters followed unsuccessful attacks by the GRU on the British Foreign Office and UK defence laboratories at Porton Down, which was also investigating the Salisbury attack.

'This attempt to access the secure systems of an international organisation working to rid the world of chemical weapons, demonstrates the GRU's disregard for the global values and rules that keep us safe.

'Our action today reinforces the clear message from the international community: we will uphold the rules-based international system and defend international institutions from those that seek to do them harm.'

British intelligence agencies have said that the GRU was behind the Salisbury Novichok attack - which left three seriously ill in hospital and killed an unsuspecting British mother caught up in it.

And in a shock development made public today, it emerged that the same Russian spy agency then tried to hack into the OPCW just a month later.

The OPCW was carrying out tests which proved the poison used to try to kill ex Russian double agent Sergei Skripal was the Cold War nerve agent Novichok and developed by Russia.

Mr Hunt lashed Moscow for launching a series of attacks on Western soil, and warned they had crossed a 'red line'.

He said: 'The first thing we are doing is to expose it, and the words matter because there are countries all over the world that are hearing both sides of the story - they're hearing what the Russians say as well.

'This is the evidence that what we are getting from Russia is fake news, and here is the hard evidence of Russian military activity.

'But of course it will go beyond that, and that is why we will be discussing with our allies what further sanctions should be imposed.

Dutch authorities released images of four Russian agents who tried to hack into the global chemical weapons watchdog at the time of the investigation into the Salisbury novichok attack. CCTV shows them when they were kicked out of the Netherlands

'We will also be discussing how we need, working with our friends and allies, to counter this pattern of cyber attacks, which is the new type of attack that the whole world is having to deal with.'

The Foreign Secretary said the brazen attempt to try to interfere with the OPCW is yet further proof that the Russians were behind the Salisbury poisoning.

He said: 'If anyone had any questions in their mind about Russian military involvement in the Salisbury poison attacks this will put to rest those doubts because here you have evidence of the Russian military launching a cyber attack on the very organisation – the international organisation in the Netherlands – set up to investigate those Novichok attacks.'

GRU carried out attacks around the world, says UK cyber security unit

The Russian intelligence service, the GRU, have in the last 24 hours been accused of being behind cyber attacks around the globe.

The British National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) says the agency were behind haking attacks on the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada), transport systems in Ukraine and democratic elections, such as the 2016 US presidential race.

The NCSC said it was 'almost certainly' the GRU behind a 'BadRabbit'attack in October 2017 that caused disruption to the Kyiv metro, Odessa airport and Russia's central bank.

And Britain's cyber security chiefs say they have 'high confidence' Russian intelligence was responsible for a strike on Wada in August 2017.

The NCSC also stated that the GRU was 'almost certainly' to blame for hacking the Democratic National Committee during the US presidential election in 2016.

And the agency pointed the finger at the GRU for accessing email accounts at a small UK-based TV station in 2015.

'And why would you do that if you weren't the guilty party?

'The reality is this part of a pattern of cyber attacks in the US the UK Malaysia, Switzerland and now the Netherlands.

'And the Russian government needs to[ know that if they flout international law in this way there will be consequences , they will be exposed and people will see the Russian Government for what they are, which is an organisation which is trying to foster instability around the world and that is totally unacceptable.'

He insisted that Britain and its allies do not want the attacks and ill-feeling between the two countries to escalate.

But in a stern rebuke to Moscow, he warned Britain is not afraid to stand up to Russia.

He said: 'We don't want any kind of escalation, and the way we prevent escalation is by making sure when this kind of thing happens Russia knows it's a red line, there are consequences and the price is going to be too high.'

And his deputy Sir Alan said that while the foiled Russian strike was almost comically cack-handed, the Russians pose a very severe threat.

He told Sky News: 'This is very dangerous.

‘On the one level this is frankly absurd and comical because they have been so cack-handed.

‘But also it’s very dangerous because the next target could be a power station or trying to stop a bank from doing its work.

'They are doing very, very dangerous and malign things and everybody has got to realise what they are up to and work collectively to fight against it.’

The Dutch Defence Ministry this morning took the extraordinary step of naming and picturing four Russian agents involved in the attack on the OPCW in April.

A briefing in The Hague was shown pictures of each of the men's passports. Alexey Minin, from Perm, to the north west of Moscow, was named as one of the men

One of the men was named as Evgeny Serebriakov and his passport of photo was released

Another of the men was named as Oleg Sotnikov, said to have been born in Oeljanovsk

The passport numbers of the men were released, including Aleksei Morenets, from Murmansk

The team of GRU officers - travelling on official Russian passports - entered the Netherlands on April 10, just a month after the Salisbury nerve agent attack.

Three days later, they parked a car carrying specialist hacking equipment outside the headquarters of the OPCW in the The Hague, where the novichok attack was being investigated.

But, before they could initiate the hacking attack, Dutch counter-intelligence officers descended on the vehicle and seized the men, who were kicked out of the country.

The attempt on the OPCW headquarters followed unsuccessful attacks by the GRU on the British Foreign Office and UK defence laboratories at Porton Down, which was also investigating the Salisbury attack.